FEATURE: Spotlight: piri & tommy — Music Musings & Such

FEATURE:

Spotlight

piri & tommy

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ONE of those incredible acts…

that are going to dominate 2023, piri & tommy are an English Drum and Bass group, formed in 2021. They are Sophie McBurnie and Tommy Villiers. They released their debut mixtape/project, froge.mp3, in October. I shall come to a couple of reviews for that soon enough. A sensational and feelgood duo, they remind me in some ways of Australian duo Confidence Man. Although their styles are slightly different, both have this incredible connection and deliver music to get you moving and together. I will arrive at a 2022 interview with the pair. First, at the end of 2021, NME featured piri & tommy. At that point they hadn’t released too much. It was a case of this clearly promising pair coming to prominence because of the amazing single, Soft Spot. That song actually appears on their debut mixtape/’project’. It was interesting hearing how the duo met and started making music together:

“For IRL couple Piri and Tommy Villiers, lockdown has been somewhat of a blessing in disguise. After (virtually) meeting via Instagram DMs earlier this year, the pair – who bonded over a mutual love of generational dance artists like Disclosure and Kaytranada – decided to bubble up in a student house together and make music as a duo.

Although spending most of her time with Tommy instead of focusing on uni might have initially been risky (vocalist Piri – real name Sophie McBurnie – was studying Chemistry before meeting her producer boyfriend, who is also in the indie-pop band Porij), things have certainly paid off since. The Manchester duo’s colourful brand of drum ‘n’ bass with a Gen Z touch has made them the latest TikTok success story.

The pair’s breakbeats-inspired single ‘Soft Spot’ started blowing up seemingly out of nowhere on the social media platform throughout the summer, standing out thanks to its singalong chorus and racing beats. A few months later, it received a major label re-release due to its sudden viral success. Now, the track has clocked up more than seven million streams on Spotify, and the couple now count PinkPantheress and Charli XCX among their fans.

Here, they tell NME about what it’s like to be at the forefront of a DIY dance scene explosion and why – with an album’s worth of bangers ready to go – this is just the start for them.

Hi Piri and Tommy Villiers! How are things?

Piri: “To be honest, life is pretty chaotic for us right now! We don’t have our own place, so we’re travelling around a lot and staying between our parents’ houses, but feeling very blessed overall by our careers.”

How did you both meet?

Piri: “Basically, I saw a picture of Tommy’s other band on Twitter and thought he was handsome. I then found [the band’s] Instagram and soon slid into his DMs!”

Tommy: “We met for a date in Piccadilly Gardens in Manchester and it was the best first date ever… so then we had another one… and another one…”

Piri: “It probably only took us a couple of weeks before we started making music together, and because of the lockdown, we had so much time to be creative and work on tunes.”

What’s your creative process like?

Tommy: “I’ve been making beats in my free time since I was about 17. Either we’ll set a vibe and I’ll make a fresh 8 bars, or we decide we like one of the old beats from my hard drive and I will send it to Sophie, and then she comes back with a song.”

Piri: “I always loved writing songs but I was felt limited by my mediocre guitar playing – I could never have imagined making an actual record! Once I met Tommy, I finally had the opportunity to write over really good beats. We just ended up being a great team”.

Charli XCX and PinkPantheress have said that they are fans of yours. That must feel pretty cool, right?

Piri: “Yeah! PinkPantheress DM’d us actually to say that she loved ‘Soft Spot’ and she thinks the beat goes stupid! That was so cool for us because she really broke through with this new pop-style, girly dance music and showed that people really want and need this style of music. And she did it without the aim of blowing up too – it was so organic.

Tommy: “Charli XCX played ‘Soft Spot’ on Radio 1, which was mad! She said it was one of her favourite songs and that she runs to it when she goes to the gym. She’s an artist that we both love and really look up to.”

Are you feeling any pressure to prove that you’ve got more than one big hit in you?

Piri: “Yeah for sure, we’re so confident in our music but ‘Soft Spot’ is definitely a big act to follow. Even though we love our unreleased music, we just really hope it does as well – especially on TikTok. I would love to see people using our music for their videos again.”

Tommy: “We definitely can’t wait to release more music though, and people are already asking for it!”.

I will move to DORK’s July interview with the incredible piri & tommy. What is clear from the interview is not only how talented they are, but the fact their music is so powerful and hooks you in! I don’t think there is anyone out there like piri & tommy:

“Following up ‘soft spot’ was quite stressful for me, because then I had to make something just as good as this,” tommy, aka Tommy Villiers, admits. “Suddenly, I knew loads of people would listen to this. I’d never had that pressure before in my life.”

Written, recorded, mixed and mastered all under that same roof, the pair’s self-sufficient nature clearly produces magic, but having to then share that insular process and deliver their next singles to a record label was nothing short of nerve-inducing. The release of follow-up ‘beachin’ was defined by apprehension. When millions of people have the lyrics to your first single bouncing around their heads, there’s a lot to live up to.

“We were kind of pessimistic about releasing ‘beachin’,” explains Sophie McBurnie, who goes by the moniker piri. “Both of us were really anxious about it, but people liked it. Now we’re a bit more comfortable and excited to release more. Tommy had imposter syndrome about it.”

“It was like ‘oh my god, I’m a producer now!’, like legit. That was the biggest track I’d ever released, and I’d mixed, mastered and recorded it all, so it was a big step up. Before, I’d just been in bands as a guitarist and singer. I never thought of myself as a legit producer. But now I am, I guess!” tommy laughs.

PHOTO CREDIT: Patrick Gunning

Despite the anxiety, as they step into this crazy new world, they still consistently deliver the opposite with their sound. Playful and upbeat, it’s fundamentally feel-good. Their latest single, ‘words’, is a condemning narrative around a lack of communication in a relationship, served alongside an old school garage style beat. piri’s vocals keep things carefree, never losing that insatiably danceable quality. With each release, they lean more heavily into their freeing, high-speed tendencies – it hooks you in like no other.

“I remember when I first discovered dance music. It’s honestly like once you’re in, there’s no going back; you just keep listening,” reflects tommy. “Once you find a new genre that’s a bit faster, you just have to keep going – it’s like, oh, this song is 200bpm, this will mess you up! It’s like a drug. It’s sick.”

piri jumps in: “I think it’s a product of people’s attention spans these days, and fast music just being sick, but people really seem to be digging the higher tempo. Any song sped-up on TikTok seems to do way better than the original, and obviously drum and bass has been huge, and hyperpop and breakcore.”

It’s a useful dynamic that has ultimately streamlined their creativity too – piri has her go-to producer, while tommy has a topliner for all of his beats. That deep knowledge of how the other works is evident – they’re in sync and prepared to push each other into different directions. Working in harmonic tandem has allowed them to become even more ambitious and at home with stretching their boundaries as musicians. With a debut album in the works, they’re set to become more comfortable with letting their listeners into their world, too.

“It’s all of the music we made in the first year of knowing each other – each song is a different memory or moment from that year,” hints tommy. “Yeah, you can listen to the lyrics and track the point of the relationship, what’s occurring between us at the time,” piri contributes.

“The whole album is just us two, just our names on it,” she continues. “All the writing, all the producing, all the mixing is just piri & tommy. I think it makes it the purest form for our first album. You’re letting people know: this is what we sound like. Even though we got signed, and it started to pop off a bit, it’s important not to just get swept up in that. We had a lot of ideas, and we made ‘soft spot’ ourselves – let’s just do the rest ourselves”.

One of the biggest releases of 2022, froge.mp3 needs to be in everyone’s lives. Ones to Watch provided more details about piri & tommy’s incredible new release and why their music sounds so natural, connected and in-sync. The way they fuse and blend with one another is amazing to hear. I think that they are going to have a huge year next year:

“Eclectic and spacey, piri & tommy’s love manifests as futuristic dance pop in their debut project, froge.mp3.

Based in the UK, the chemistry between singer piri and production partner Tommy Villiers couldn’t be feigned, mostly because it isn’t. Meeting on a date and then embarking on a rollercoaster on-again-off-again relationship, their viral single “soft spot” was written from the gaze of piri’s longing. Though lucky for us, it worked itself out.

“[froge.mp3] is basically a diary of the first year tommy and I have been making music, and pretty much the first year of us knowing each other at all," shares piri. "Each song (in both lyrics and vibe) captures a different point in time of our journey, and the different experiences and emotions we were going through. We really wanted to avoid guiding or limiting ourselves too much during the creative process: we made whatever we felt like, just for fun, and I can definitely feel that energy of us enjoying being creative and with no pressure when listening back. It’s so cool having a collection of tracks to document parts of our lives in that way, like a little time capsule.”

The energy between the duo is perfectly encapsulated sonically, both softly passionate and fiercely gentle. Each track is a hit of dopamine, a euphoric high you never want to come down from.

Featuring already popularized singles “on & on” and “words,” froge.mp3 only continues to explore the edges of their modernized garage sound with tracks like “can we” and “player 2.” You can hear influences of artists they were raised on, from MJ Cole to The Meters, while finding footing next to the artists who are becoming peers, from Kaytranda to PinkPantheress.

piri & tommy’s essence is liberatingly playful because to their core, they’re kids having fun. piri’s lyrics and porcelain voice encompass the charm of their romance, while Villier’s production is a digital experiment gone beautifully right. They create first and think second, laughing along the way.

With a nearly sold-out tour ahead of them, the addictive duo has amassed a feverish following because of what they’ve gifted long car rides and impromptu dance sessions. Infused with love and humble chaos, there isn’t a doubt that their music is going a very long way”.

I will wrap things up with a review from DORK. Big fans of piri & tommy, they definitely loved what the heard on the sensational froge.mp3. I have been listening to it quite a bit the last couple of weeks, and I love everything on it! You just know the duo are going to be making music together for years to come:

“The build-up to a debut ‘project’ hasn’t been stress-free for piri & tommy; the pair’s collaboration marks the first time either musician has taken up their newfound roles, and they both felt the anxiety of following up TikTok sensation ‘soft spot’ – not to mention a major label signing. The blistering hype around the dance act has funnelled directly into an air-tight, comprehensive taster of their potential in the form of ‘froge.mp3’.

piri & tommy’s music defines and describes the energy they create at their live shows, with rattling percussion (‘Say It’, ‘Can We’) fuelling popping nights, and deeper beats (‘Silver Lining’, ‘Sunlight’) echoing blurry days. It is quite ridiculous that this Mancunian couple has so quickly summoned such a formidable collection of tracks, and already proved that each of them can cause chaos at the drop of a hat.

A university bedroom project exploded onto the big stages, the freeing nature of piri & tommy’s creative pursuit explains why its experimentation and fluidity rule supreme. They throw Gen-Z eyes on a much-celebration genre, splicing and dicing it into the ears of eager new listeners in a format digestible to their era of music fans.

At its core, though, ‘froge.mp3’ digests the ups and downs, smooth sailing and tight corners, of piri & tommy’s own relationship – this internal inspiration, as well as their effortless chemistry, makes it a release that only they could have come together to curate. Praise be to Instagram DMs”.

If you have not heard the name piri & tommy or know about their music, then I would say to dive in! I am sure there are going to be tour dates next year and some more tracks. Where they go from here is up to them. There is this huge wave of support behind them. With this effortless and amazing chemistry between Sophie McBurnie and Tommy Villiers, it is so easy to fall for the music of piri & tommy! There is no doubt that they are…